Moving to an island in the middle of the Pacific, it's fairly easy to find your location when the local weather person comes on. On Oahu, it was obvious which island was ours. Plus, the weather didn't matter too much. Ewa Beach is like Groundhog Day: Highs in the mid to upper 80s, windward and mauka showers. Moving to a new state, though, is different. It took us almost three weeks before we realized we live in St. Clair county. And to this day, when the weatherman shows us the map with a low or high pressure coming through, Moose Man and I do not know which county is us. We actually look at each other and shrug. You see the lots of green, yellow, orange, red, and fuchsia blobs on the screen? Well, one of those is over our county, meaning we might get lots of rain. Or we might just get a sprinkle. We just don't know. So if I want the weather report, I just look out the window the way my ancestors did it. Or I listen to the radio if I happen to be in the car.
As a Southerner, I am accustomed to tornadoes. Yes friends, these colossal, vacuous columns of clouds occur anytime, anywhere - in the middle of your cousin's wedding, in the late afternoon on a Tuesday, in the middle of a funeral. A person's house might be completely gone with just the foundation and bits of plumbing left behind, while two houses down, they are only missing a few shingles and everything else is still standing. I vaguely remember going to the basement Christmas Eve when I was a young pixie. That was also the same Christmas where we all wore shorts and T-shirts because it was 85 degrees out. There is no rhyme or reason for it, it's just an accepted fact one deals with when living the in South. We get them in the Midwest, too, though, until recently having never lived in the Midwest, I could not confirm this. When the sky gets that sickly mint green color and the clouds look like they could break down your front door like a Mafiosi thug, you know it is time to head to the basement or a closet or someplace with no windows and little furniture.
Moose Man, however, does not. He was raised in Seattle, a place where they would not know a tornado if it knocked on their front door like the Land Shark. Were it to try and make its way inside the house, I should think his mother would try to suck it up with a vacuum cleaner because it would get dirt, dust, and whatnot all over the place.
Needless to say, the first week we are here in Illinois, we were driving around on our way back to the temporary housing on base after running errands, when my cell phone rang. It was my dad. He and I are chatting away, when we hear tornado sirens going off. We were in a residential neighborhood - though the houses were more Brady-esque split-levels from the 70s, maybe early 80s, the lawns were kept neat and tidy and the houses were in good condition. Moose Man is driving around, oblivious to the sirens. People are starting to come out of their homes and stand on the porches and sidewalks. They are all pointing and looking at the sky, which in turn makes me look at the sky. I see the sky is a lurid green and the storm clouds are steely grey, almost a purple, actually. I tell my father that I have to call him back and hang up.
"Moose Man, do you see how the trees are bending in the wind like that?"
"Yeah," as he continues to drive.
"That means the wind's picking up big time."
"Okay."
I had asked him earlier in the week if he'd experienced tornadoes before. He sort of gave me a yes, saying his college he went to in Colorado had constant troubles with storms and the wind was so bad that on more than one occasion the windows in a building were blown out. I took this as a, "Yes, I have experienced tornados before." However, I later found out this was not the case. However, I was not getting through to him and needed to try another route.
"Do you see the sky?"
"Yeah."
"That's not a good thing, those clouds there. Those are bad. The sky's color is very bad."
He shrugged and kept driving.
I was befuddled that he did not grasp the severity of the situation. Then I realized he's never experienced a tornado. This made me think of Waimea Bay in October of 2004.
The waves were 15-20 footers, pretty big, but typical for that time of year; later in the winter they get even bigger. Upon arrival, Moose Man went charging out into the ocean, while I stayed behind with some friends of ours on the shore. We would watch him get sucked into the ocean and then spit back out, sometimes upside-down, twenty yards down the beach. It was actually quite funny. People were losing their suits (or parts of them) and falling all over each other like some Marx Brothers comedy. I was a schmuck and decided to go into the water because it looked like fun.
As soon as I got in the water, I was knocked down and didn't know which was was up. I surfaced, gasping for air, and felt like a nearly-drowned version of Cousin Itt from "The Addams Family." My hair was wet and matted and in my face. It had been in a ponytail when I got in the water. I felt around, hoping to find the ponytail holder. No such luck. Moose Man was about six feet from me and started laughing as soon as he saw me. This, naturally, did not sit well with me. I knew I looked ridiculous, I did not need my dear husband of five months to tell me this. I am treading water and fuming. Suddenly he stops laughing and dives into the water. Before I can ask him what's going on, I am punched in the face by a wave. When I surfaced again, I realized it is not a good thing for me to be in the water; I need to get my Pixie Tush out of there as quickly as possible. I started to head for the shore. I was halfway up the beach when the wave grabbed me from behind and dragged me back into the water. I started yelling at my friends on the beach, but they were far enough away they couldn't hear me. They thought I was putting on a comedy routine for them. Oh no. Oh nonononono. Miss Pixie was dragged, literally kicking and screaming, back into the ocean. After being forced to do somersaults and flips in the water about four times, I hurled myself from the ocean like my grandmother at a 75% off sale (read: like I was shot out of a cannon). I went up the beach as quickly as I could. This was not easy, as the beach was not a gentle slope, but more like a 30% grade. I was on my hands and knees at one point, just out of the ocean's grasp. Finally I was back with our companions and promptly collapsed in a heap on the beach towel, spitting out a mouthful of sand. I had more sand in my swimsuit than all of the Panhandle of Florida. As it was a one-piece, there was no good way to get it out without being arrested for indecent exposure. So I wallowed and stewed.
Moose Man, however, continued to have a great time, frolicking in the ocean. About an hour later he moseyed on up to us. He made some offhand comment about the ocean kicking my butt and I glared at him.
"How was I supposed to know this?" I asked him.
"Well, everyone knows you're not supposed to turn your back on the ocean. It's common knowledge."
"Um, hi? I'm from a land-locked state, remember? We don't have oceans, we have Lake Ouachita and Lake Catherine. We don't have tides, we have the wakes from speedboats."
This finally seemed to resonate with him. "Ohhhh."
"Yeahhhh," I replied.
This, gentle reader, is how I felt about Moose Man and the Tornado that was approaching. He had no idea what forces of nature he was dealing with. Trying to drop hints will not help someone who does not speak your language. I realized now was not the time for being tactful, I needed to be all-out blunt.
"Moose Man, I am not trying to scare you, but there is a tornado coming very, very soon. We need to get to a basement NOW!" This started to make him realize that there was a bit more urgency needed right now than had been five minutes ago. Thankfully, we were near the model home where we're going to build our house. He drove us there and we ran the ten feet to the inside, emerging like drowned rats. The usual lady we deal with, Diana, was not there, but her assistant, Barbara, was.
"Hi!" we said brightly, trying to ignore the fact that we were dripping water all over the carpet. "The sirens were going off, and this was the closest place with a basement. I hope we aren't intruding or interrupting anything."
"Not at all! I was just looking out the back door and could see the funnel start to form. I don't think it actually did, so I think the worst is over." The phone rang. It was Diana. Apparently it was her day off and she had gone to the mall to do some shopping. However, when the tornado sirens went off, Diana was ushered to the children's section of Dillard's along with everyone else at the mall. She was calling Barbara every 15 minutes, just so she could keep her sanity.
While Barbara was on the phone, we helped ourselves to some beverages they keep in the fridge and bite-sized candy. We walked back to the office and sat down, unsure of what to do next. Barbara was on the phone and laughing. "What is that awful racket in the background?It's a what?! Is that a bullhorn?!" Apparently, it was. And a large, prison matronly woman was using it to yell at people.
"Attention Monkey Ward shoppers! Please return to the Children's section for your safety! Keep your funky butts off my couches and other items from the more comfortable, but less-safe sections. I want those kiesters on that cold, concrete floor with the carpet that has not been cleaned since it was put down during the second Clinton administration and has had animal crackers and Cheerios ground into it! You will ignore the countless stains from the contents of Sippy cups, as well as the stains from being barfed on and sneezed on with Fudgesicle juice!"
Honestly, I think that's my idea of the Sixth Circle of Hell. And the thing is, they wouldn't let anyone leave, either. Surely, though, if everyone made a break for it, there is no way they could control that crowd. It would be like a stampede at a Ted Nugent concert. Safety in numbers, people. Safety in numbers.
The next time we saw Diana, we gave her a flask with a note that said, "For tornado emergency use only."
